I had always been wondering when the situation would change. But the change happened sooner than I thought–well, I initiated it. It took just a small talk during a coffee break to join one of our largest research programmes concerning Future Internet and Agri-food, SmartAgriFood.  I was quite excited about it: besides the content that seems attractive to a heavy internet user like me, it seems to me a great opportunity to get acquainted with the ins and outs of European projects. 

My first assignment was to prepare for a TelCo for which a Doodle call was published on the WebDav of the project. Meeting documents were also put in the DropBox of my colleague. My first project meeting was to attend the work shop on ‘Lauching a Coalition for Action on ICT in regional programmes’ at the Commission in Brussels. It felt a bit strange for someone with an Asian face to talk about Smart Specialisation in Europe, but I felt quite comfortable with terms like Ex ante conditionalities and ex post conditionalities. Europe is not just about the races. Above all, I enjoyed the faultless English from the British, and couldn’t help falling for the charm of the Spanish. It was a nice trip…even just to get used to all the project lingo.

While waiting for 2012 to arrive, I asked my now 13-year-old son about his new year’s resolution. After much delibration, he said that he would help me clean up our dinner table everyday after dinner.

At first I was a bit disappointed: cleaning up the table? There is nothing challenging about it. I had expected something more ambitious, and perhaps more intellectual, like reading a book. But then I realized what a great commitment it means: it is easy to help once in a while, but to do it every single day would require a great amount of discipline. I hope we both stick to our new year’s resolutions.

And this week’s Economist is full of similar stories. The article ’why China fails at football’ for example begins with a story:

The Budda tells the people he can fulfil only one of their wishes. Someone asks: “Could you lower the price of property in China so that people can afford it?” Seeing the Buddha frown in silence, the person makes another wish: “Could you make the Chinese football team qualify for a World Cup?” After a long sigh, the Budda says: “Let’s talk about property prices”.

I told this joke at dinner table with a Dutch investor and a Chinese entrepreneur/investor when the subject happened to be football. The Dutch investor laughed, but the Chinese investor was not amused- she has a fortune in properties and she thinks football is just a game. Perhaps she made a different wish to the Buddha.

 ’So, it looks like you are having a big party!!’ In my positive frame of mind, I made a cheerful comment to liven up the atmosphere a bit. 

“No…unlukily it’s not true”, the man forced a smile,  but it was more like a chagrin. 

“Oh, come on, be a bit more friendly and positive”, in my mind I grumbled to myself, ”how hard is that?”.  

As if read my mind, the man looked into my eyes and said: “my little son passed away yesterday, so we have some family visits today. But it’s not a party.”. His words really struck me, and the sorrow in his eyes. How could I have missed that? I had so much sympathy for the man that I felt ashamed of the prejudice of my ‘positive’ frame of mind.

With hindsight, I should have waited with my previous decision to purchase the new pair of glasses with much higher power. But at that time I was so happy to discover the cause for my headache that I completely forgot to apply my usual ‘real-options’ way of thinking. As I wrote in my previous blog, decisions like purchasing new glasses are certainly not  ’now or never’, have sunk costs, and have uncertain outcomes–a textbook example of real options.

But I was in a very different mindset at the time when I visited the first optician. It was the day that I received the e-mail from Brian, who read my blog and shared with me his new thought on real options:  There are lots of decisions in life that are ‘now or never’, i.e., for which the option of waiting is not real. Such as the decision to learn to ski…if you keep postponing it, someday you will be too old to do that. The same can apply in business- the niche market is there but if you are not the first to jump in, the opportunity will be lost. 

“It is of course silly to have regrets about what might have been”, wrote Brian, ”But the young should be aware of the maxim to ‘strike while the iron is hot’ “.

Well, I guess I must have taken the maxim a bit too far and struck the wrong iron…

With hindsight, it now seems quite obvious and logical now that I should have started by visiting the optican when the complaints started. But I guess the right choice does not always present itself in the first place. Anyway, I am more than happy to know that my headache was not only ’metaphysical’ and I can go back to the ‘battle field’ soon.

But my mind is already back to topics like risks, agroclusters, agroparks, antibiotics, and generating random thoughts about industrial ecology: It is true that synergy exists in symbiotic relationships, but it is hard to establish symbiotic relationships for synergy.

Each time when I hear people talking about real options, I would hear Brian Hardaker questioning me again in his Australian English.  That was about 8 years ago when we met to discuss my PhD proposal on ‘Discovering Real options in controlling foot-and-mouth diseases’. At that time, the Real Options approach promised to become the new paradigm of decision-making under uncertainty. Brian was intrigued by the ‘hype’, but clearly not convinced of the added-value of real options. In fact, he was quite skeptical about the whole Real Options thing. In his opinion, as I interpreted,  the real options approach was not much more than dynamic programming with the option of waiting included when it comes to dynamic decision-making.

After years of muddling through in the worlds of real options and epidemic diseases, I eventually came to the same conclusion. It’s tough to admit, but the professor was right, the real options approach was indeed not that novel, at least, not qualifying as a new paradigm. But so are many other ‘new’ theories and ‘new’ insights:  they merely offer new vantage points or new angles to look at the same old thing.  The success of real options at that time could probably be attributed to the fact that, while not many people were familiar with dynamic programming, many people did trade in options or knew about financial options. And most people intuitively value options more than obligations and tend to procrastinate if decisions involve high sunk costs and high uncertainty.

My close friends often sneer at me when I talk about the science of decision-making as part of my profession. They have good reasons: For someone who has spent more than 15 years hesitating whether or not to get a divorce, it’s hard to imagine that she knows how to make good decisions. 

Well,  I have had hard time with my marriage and have kept people waiting for the resolution. But in my defence I would argue that decision-making is seldom a now-or-never thing, and I have just been waiting for the right moment. Viewed from this perspective, I am probably a born ‘Real Option-ist’:  someone who recognizes the possibility of divorcing as an option, but not an obligation, to change my life for something potentially better than remaining in a marriage that sucks most of the time.  I have kept postponing the decision because I realize that, once I actually ’exercise’ this option, there would be irreversible costs, both financially and emotionally, which might be avoided if I postpone the decision.

Of course postponing the decision also has costs, and it can cost dearly. Even when all the mental energy that was consumed can be ignored, one should always question whether the benefits of waiting can offset the costs. When this is not the case, it is high time to realize that holding real options is no excuse for indulging in procrastination.

More than 100 years have passed since the publication of Veblen’s The Theory of the Leisure Class. Many new things have been invented and turned into necessity. Fashion has taken several turns. But the fashion world hasn’t changed much, except that Apple has become the Gucci of gadgets. It is amazing to see how the invention of non-essential goods and services keeps thriving and becoming a necessity for the spiritual well-being of many. 

I have nothing against fashion and the bitten Apple, they are beautiful products.  I just feel uneasy watching the market encouraging the invention of one useless thing after another by appealing to people’s spiritual need to be special, unique, and superior. The irony is, there is nothing special of longing to be viewed as special. It merely evidences that man is by nature a social animal and the production of ‘socially justified wastes’ will continue to dominate the developed economies till there is nothing to be wasted.

The blades made blunt by my hair??

While sitting on the massage chair having my hair washed, I kept thinking about her remark.  That something so strong and sharp as the blade of the scissors can be made blunt by something so light and soft as the hair is revealing. It is the power of many, however light and soft as individual, that collectively wears out the strongest few. 

But it is the gel that makes the hair harder and increases the damage to the blade, not the hair in its purest state. To remove the hair with gel, it is better to wash the hair first, then cut the clean hair with the scissors. Simply let water and time do their job.  

One thing at a time. Let the problems soften themselves. Take breaks. Preserve the strength for the right moment. Enjoy Il bel far niente, the beauty of doing nothing…the key to the sustainability of strength.